Regular Brötzmann and Keiji Haino collaborator, Shoji Hano returns to Cafe OTO for a two day residency. One of Japan's leading free players, Hano's playing is both virtuosic but also idiosyncratic, displaying his roots in Taiko drumming and mixing polyrhythmic complexity with incredible strength and speed. He was also a member of legendary psych rock band High Rise alongside Munehiro Narita and Asahito Nanjo, touring the US and Europe in the late 90s.

Shoji Hano started playing avant-garde jazz with the late pianist Yoshito Osawa in 1975. Around that time Hano met trumpeter Toshinori Kondo, who introduced him to the martial art Shintaido. Since that time, the philosophical concepts of Shintaido have influenced Hano's music.

Hano has also played with such Japanese musicians as the late alto sax player Kaoru Abe, sax player Mototeru Takagi, and trombonist Masahiko Kono; and leading European and American musicians like guitarists Henry Kaiser, Eugene Chadbourne and Hans Reichel, reed players Peter Brötzmann, Dror Feiler and Hans Koch, cellist Tristan Honzingar, trombonist Johannes Bauer and bassist William Parker.

"Hano's methodical and hyper-articulate drumming, inspired by the moving meditation practice Shintaido and relying heavily on floor toms and cymbals, paces and frames the sharp animal intelligence of Brötzmann's soloing with a preternatural calm... Together they offer a key lesson about improvisation: it isn't about doing the unique and unexpected all the time; its about creating the feeling that, at any moment, one could do them. The said and unsaid become equal and the silence rings as loud as the fury." The WIRE (on 'Funny Rat/s 3')



DAY ONE : PAUL DUNMALL & JOHN EDWARDS

Dunmall is a distinctive and forceful musical presence, whether on tenor and soprano saxophones, or on his assortment of bagpipes, that he'll also be playing here and with which he can summon shimmering up storms of polyphonic drone and sustained over/underrtones, as heard in his overwhelming duo with Chris Corsano at Oto last year and on their LP for ESP/Disk. Over the years he's played with an amazing range of musicians, including Alice Coltrane, Johnny 'Guitar' Watson, Keith Tippett, Marcus Stockhausen, Henry Grimes, Andrew Cyrille, and Matthew Shipp, and he remains a much in demand musician, the immense physical power of his playing always underpinned by his acute awareness of space and phrasing.

John Edwards is a true virtuoso whose staggering range of techniques and boundless musical imagination have redefined the possibility of the double bass and dramatically expanded its role, whether playing solo or with others. Perpetually in demand, he has played with Evan Parker, Sunny Murray, Derek Bailey, John Wall, Joe McPhee, Lol Coxhill, and many others.




DAY TWO : ALEX WARD & PAT THOMAS

Hano's duo recording with Derek Bailey (Fish, 2001) was one of the highlights of Bailey's late work and one of The Wire's records of the year, a dense mass of jagged electric guitar and surging drums. For the second night of the residency, Hano is joined by two of Bailey's closest musical companions, Alex Ward, here on electric guitar, and the piano and electronics of Pat Thomas for what promises to be a series of fast and noisy exchanges.

Ward has been active in free improvisation since being given his first gig by Derek Bailey in 1987, going on to work with a wide range of musicians as a clarinettist (sometimes also on alto sax). He has become increasingly busy since 2000 as a guitarist playing loud, skronking electric guitar in groups such as NEW (with Steve Noble and John Edwards), Dead Days Beyond Help (with Jem Doulton, where he sings as well), and with the ecstatic agonies of his own free jazz quartet Predicate (with Tim Hill, Dom Lash and Mark Sanders).

Pat Thomas studied classical piano from aged 8 and started playing Jazz from the age of 16. He has since gone on to develop an utterly unique style - embracing improvisation, jazz and new music. He has played with Derek Bailey in Company Week (1990/91) and in the trio AND (with Noble) – with Tony Oxley’s Quartet and Celebration Orchestra and in Duo with Lol Coxhill.

"Sartorially shabby as Thomas may be, and on first impression even rather stolid, he has a somewhat imperious charisma that’s immediately amplified when he starts to play. Unlike other pianists whose virtuosity seems to be racing ahead of their thought processes Thomas always seems supremely in command of his gift, and his playing, no matter how free and ready to tangle with abstraction, always carries a charge of authoritative exactitude." The Jazzmann